New Year's resolutions

[azziria]

I've been thinking a bit about this, because 2011 was hard and I want 2012 to go a bit better. I've thought a lot about it, and in the end I've come up with one thing:

To be as kind and understanding to myself as I am to others.

I know that's not a SMART objective, and I can break it down into all sorts of concrete goals for exercise etc, but it is the overarching thing that I need to do this year. Maybe I should call it my mission statement?

Comments

[verasteine.livejournal.com]

How is that not a smart objective? I think it's a great idea, and wish I were better at it.

[azziria.livejournal.com]

Ah, it's smart but it's not SMART: Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Timely (forgive me, I've been running training courses at work...).

[verasteine.livejournal.com]

Oh! Yes, no, it isn't, but it's good and I, um, may be slightly allergic to SMART objectives :).

[azziria.livejournal.com]

Yes, so am I, really.

This isn't really a resolution that lends itself to those sort of objectives anyway. For me, I think it's going to be more a case of working on catching and challenging negative thought patterns before they have a chance to spiral out of control - I've been doing some CBT work that might be starting to help. I also need to schedule in a regular personal sanity check where I ask myself what I've done that's nice for *me* in the last day/week/whatever - I have a tendency to put others first and then get resentful and depressed and dwell on how nobody cares about what *I* want, when in fact I suspect that I need to care about myself more and actually make a point of doing something nice for myself occasionally.

Why do I have to make life so hard for myself, that's what I want to know - why can't I just look on the bright side and let myself be happy? And I'm challenging that negative thought right now... *g*

[verasteine.livejournal.com]

CBT can be very useful (so I'm told, you may be talking to the only person for whom it doesn't work) and yes, keeping yourself in mind and putting yourself first are very smart things to do! I applaud this idea.

Life is hard; it's how we work our way through it that counts. And hey, look, you're doing this thing and talking about it, baby steps!